In the latest issue, Garrett Seivold, Senior Writer at Loss Prevention Magazine, published An About-Face for LP? Advances in Identification Technology Let Retailers Get Proactive. The article dives into the latest tech in retail security and loss prevention (LP), including surveillance and facial recognition. Here are a few excerpts:

More than ever, retailers have the ability to shift security upstream—to move from reactive strategies of catching or investigating criminals to identifying them before they ever have a chance to strike. But even if technology is now ready for retailers, are retailers ready for the technology?

Facial recognition technology (FRT) and other identification technologies clearly have momentum. It has captivated mainstream press attention, has overcome multiple technological hurdles, and has largely addressed the mismatch between promise and performance that held it back in years’ past. All this is leading to some significantly optimistic predictions for FRT.

It’s still a rarity in US retail stores, but some are already having success identifying chronic returners, counterfeiters, thieves, and other persons of interest—and it’s creating interest among others.

[A] great use [of FRT], according to Andrew Chapman, senior vice president of sales at 3VR, is to identify if an individual who comes in empty-handed is shortly thereafter at the return desk carrying a package. “Some retailers use that to at least reject the return, and for that it’s a great tool,” he said.

For effective applications in retail, LP leaders shouldn’t try to go it alone. “Absolutely, partnerships with IT and working with technology teams is an important part of it,” said Uma Welingkar, product manager at 3VR. It seems to be the thing that best enables projects to progress past the testing stage, she suggested.